Book Forum, Anyone?

[+ quoththeraven]

I kid, I kid. But I've been thinking about starting a thread about books for awhile, and Bigvalboy's New Year's resolution to read more is as good an excuse as any.

 

So what kind of books do you like to read? Read anything great lately? Or terrible? Here's a place where you can discuss it.

 

I'm a big fan of mysteries, detective novels, and thrillers, especially psychological thrillers. A couple of months ago, I read everything Rex Stout published featuring Nero Wolfe. My more recent reading probably wouldn't interest you, but the mystery series penned by Richard Stevenson (featuring PI Donald Strachey), Joseph Hansen (featuring insurance investigator Dave Brandstetter) and Michael Nava (featuring lawyer Henry Rios) might.

 

I found Nava's first Henry Rios book, The Little Death, overly cynical and a little scattered, so I haven't read more (other people swear by them). Of the other two, Hansen is the better writer but Stevenson is funnier and more political. He also happens to write about a location I'm familiar with.

 

Craig Johnson's Walt Longmire series, the basis for the TV shows, is also good, as is Tess Gerritsen's Rizzoli & Isles series.

Edited January 7, 2016 by quoththeraven

[bigvalboy]

Already inspired...Thank you QTR and Adam Smith. Perhaps we could just tag along in the Comedy and Tragedy Forum.

A Forum For the Arts: Literature, Theater, Music, Art, and Dance. No television or pop music please.

[marylander1940]

I kid, I kid. But I've been thinking about starting a thread about books for awhile, and Bigvalboy's New Year's resolution to read more is as good an excuse as any.

 

So what kind of books do you like to read? Read anything great lately? Or terrible? Here's a place where you can discuss it.

 

I'm a big fan of mysteries, detective novels, and thrillers, especially psychological thrillers. A couple of months ago, I read everything Rex Stout published featuring Nero Wolfe. My more recent reading probably wouldn't interest you, but the mystery series penned by Richard Stevenson (featuring PI Donald Strachey), Joseph Hansen (featuring insurance investigator Dave Brandstetter) and Michael Nava (featuring lawyer Henry Rios) might.

 

I found Nava's first Henry Rios book, The Little Death, overly cynical and a little scattered, so I haven't read more (other people swear by them). Of the other two, Hansen is the better writer but Stevenson is funnier and more polotical. He also happens to write about a location I'm familiar with.

 

Craig Johnson's Walt Longmire series, the basis for the TV shows, is also good, as is Tess Gerritsen's Rizzoli & Isles series.

 

 

yes, if we have the SPORTS and FINANCIAL MARKET FORUMS...

 

http://www.phrasehq.com/media/W1siZiIsIjIwMTQvMDkvMDcvMTUvNTIvMzcvODAxL3F1aWRfcHJvX3F1b18xLmpwZyJdXQ/quid%20pro%20quo%201.jpg?sha=ad112e3d

[+ azdr0710]

I prefer non-fiction or very well-written historical fiction (Michener style)....typical fiction can sometimes be a bit contrived, but not always.....

 

Carl Hiaasen is always fun to read....and "Devil In The White City" is my current read - it may be made into a movie soon if DiCaprio and others come to an agreement, I hear

[Kuriousity]

I propose we have a forum just dedicated to off road racing trucks because it is something I am interested in even though no one else is interested in it.

 

I should read more, I wish I had time. I have a Kindle, I have a Kindle Unlimited membership. I should read more. I should...

 

....

 

 

I recommend Christopher Buckley....

[Kuriousity]

I recommend Christopher Buckley....

 

My personal favorite is "Florence of Arabia"

[Mikegaite]

I actually was thinking about starting one of these threads at least in reference to escorting. I was reading Richard Ford's Canada and there was a passing reference to women who would escort on trains. They would buy roundtrip train tickets but then never actually got off the the trains at the destination city. They just rode the trains back and forth meeting customers in the train compartments, and I wondered if this detail lacked verisimilitude or if it really depicted an old-fashioned way of high-end escorting before the Internet came along.

[+ FreshFluff]

Eichmann in Jerusalem, Hannah Arendt

 

Putting aside her oft-misunderstood banality of evil thesis: Eichmann's defense was ripe for mockery, and Arendt makes the most of it.

http://platypus1917.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/arendt_eichmanninjerusalem.pdf

[seaboy4hire]

The Red Fox by Anthony Hyde and P.S. Your Cat Is Dead both fiction.

 

http://www.amazon.com/Red-Fox-Anthony-Hyde/dp/0345328396

 

http://www.amazon.com/P-S-Your-Cat-Is-Dead/dp/0312321201

 

Hugs,

Greg

[+ bigjoey]

I prefer non-fiction or very well-written historical fiction (Michener style)....typical fiction can sometimes be a bit contrived, but not always.....

 

Carl Hiaasen is always fun to read....and "Devil In The White City" is my current read - it may be made into a movie soon if DiCaprio and others come to an agreement, I hear

 

Finished "Devil in the White City" a few months ago and loved it. Great book and would make a good movie. I can definitely see DiCaprio in the lead role.

[+ WilliamM]

I kid, I kid. But I've been thinking about starting a thread about books for awhile, and Bigvalboy's New Year's resolution to read more is as good an excuse as any.

 

So what kind of books do you like to read? Read anything great lately? Or terrible? Here's a place where you can discuss it.

 

I'm a big fan of mysteries, detective novels, and thrillers, especially psychological thrillers. A couple of months ago, I read everything Rex Stout published featuring Nero Wolfe. My more recent reading probably wouldn't interest you, but the mystery series penned by Richard Stevenson (featuring PI Donald Strachey), Joseph Hansen (featuring insurance investigator Dave Brandstetter) and Michael Nava (featuring lawyer Henry Rios) might.

 

I found Nava's first Henry Rios book, The Little Death, overly cynical and a little scattered, so I haven't read more (other people swear by them). Of the other two, Hansen is the better writer but Stevenson is funnier and more political. He also happens to write about a location I'm familiar with.

 

Craig Johnson's Walt Longmire series, the basis for the TV shows, is also good, as is Tess Gerritsen's Rizzoli & Isles series.

 

I have read all of Hansen's, Nava's, and Stevenson's books. Hansen's books particularly appeal to me because of the progress of his relationship with his younger male black lover. His books arere small gems, a word I seldom use.

 

Caution though. Lucky and I used to post a list of the books we read the previous year in early January. We stopped after two or three years after realizing how little in common we had in our reading. Right now in another forum, MrMiniver and I disagree about Tolstoy's "War and Peace." I have read the book several times; Miniver prefers the new British multi-part TV series.

Edited January 7, 2016 by WilliamM

[+ quoththeraven]

I propose we have a forum just dedicated to off road racing trucks because it is something I am interested in even though no one else is interested in it.

 

I should read more, I wish I had time. I have a Kindle, I have a Kindle Unlimited membership. I should read more. I should...

 

....

 

If you are not reading much, perhaps you should cancel Kindle Unlimited. Not that it's a lot of money per month (I have it), but still.

 

I would be lost without my Kindle Fire. I use it far more than I use my desktop. Typing on a touchscreen is still an art I haven't completely mastered, though.

 

I actually was thinking about starting one of these threads at least in reference to escorting. I was reading Richard Ford's Canada and there was a passing reference to women who would escort on trains. They would buy roundtrip train tickets but then never actually got off the the trains at the destination city. They just rode the trains back and forth meeting customers in the train compartments, and I wondered if this detail lacked verisimilitude or if it really depicted an old-fashioned way of high-end escorting before the Internet came along.

 

People are so unaccountable that this could be true -- it sounds a lot more comfortable to me than fucking in an airplane toilet, but who knows? Perhaps it was something the author ran across in his research.

 

A quick look on the internet neither confirmed nor denied the veracity of this.

 

Also, you reminded me about The Crimson Petal and the White by Michel Faber. After a point, I skimmed -- it leaned a little too far toward magical realism for what I was looking for -- but the beginning, and its depiction of how sex work was an objectively much better choice for a young working-class widow and mother during the Victorian era than so-called "honest work," is memorable.

Edited January 7, 2016 by quoththeraven

[+ quoththeraven]

I have read all of Hansen's, Nava's, and Stevenson's books. Hansen's books particularly appeal to me because of the progress of his relationship with his younger male black lover. His books arere small gems, a word I seldom use.

 

Caution though. Lucky and I used to post a list of the books we read the previous year in early January. We stopped after two or three years after realizing how little in common we had in our reading. Right now in another forum, MrMiniver and I disagree about Tolstoy's "War and Peace." I have read the book several times; Miniver prefers the new British multi-part TV series.

 

My favorite novel is Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov. Jane Austen is my favorite novelist. (Much of the time, Dostoevsky was in need of a good editor.) Somehow I don't think I'll find a lot of people here who share those preferences.

 

That's fine. Plenty of my Twitter friends are Austen fans. I can get my share of Austen discussion there (and have).

 

Movie and TV adaptations can do things books can't and sometimes bring in people who wouldn't or don't have time to read the books -- watching a TV version of David Copperfield is what got me to read the book after fizzling out on reading Oliver Twist because there were too many unfamiliar words -- but books also have advantages movies and TV don't. I usually wind up preferring the books. Occasionally I like both equally.

[jackjackjack]

Dan Brown

[stop]

Finished "Devil in the White City" a few months ago and loved it. Great book and would make a good movie. I can definitely see DiCaprio in the lead role.

 

devil In the white city is one of my favorites. I detest Leonardo DiCrappyo though so was disappointed to hear he was going to be in it. Erik Larson's other books are good too. I love his mix of fiction and fact.

 

Caleb Carr is another good author he has a book called the Alieniest that is a great read.

[+ bashful]

Finished "Devil in the White City" a few months ago and loved it

 

Thanks for reminding me of "The Devil in the White City". I started to read it many years ago. Barely got past a few chapters when I was called out of town for work, which turned into four plus years of traveling. It's been sitting on my bookshelf ever since. This thread has inspired me to pull it off the shelf. Thank you. Of the more prolific authors, in my younger days, I loved to read Steven King. John Grisham was occasionally a hit, but mostly a miss for me. Read "The Firm" before it became a movie. I enjoyed it, and if I remember right, the ending is different (and I liked better) than the movie. Currently reading "The Guilty" by David Baldacci, and it's holding my attention very well. When not knowing what to read next, I gravitate to biographies, mostly of famous people during the last century.

[+ purplekow]

I actually was thinking about starting one of these threads at least in reference to escorting. I was reading Richard Ford's Canada and there was a passing reference to women who would escort on trains. They would buy roundtrip train tickets but then never actually got off the the trains at the destination city. They just rode the trains back and forth meeting customers in the train compartments, and I wondered if this detail lacked verisimilitude or if it really depicted an old-fashioned way of high-end escorting before the Internet came along.

Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and his Years of Pilgrimage by Haruki Murakami is the last novel I finished. I handed it off, as I like to pass on books I have enjoyed to people I enjoy. I hope to have a blow by blow discussion of the book at some point. It had my attention for the first 2/3 but the finish just did not carry the day. I found much of it thought provoking as to how it related to my life, but again, it seems the author made some insightful observations but then took them to a rather pedestrian end. I am now reading 1Q84 by the same author. I have started this in the past only to put it down. I am giving it another go.

[body2body]

I tend to prefer Science Fiction, and Historical Fiction. I guess I have a problem with the here and now. I recently read Margaret Atwood's Maddadam, the last in the group that began with Oryx and Crake. She is a wonderful writer who paints an amusing and frightening view of where we are possibly headed. I'm in the midst of reading Kim Stanley Robinson's Aurora. This is brilliant complex hard science fiction (meaning that the emphasis is on real science and extrapolated technology). It is fascinating. I adored Coleen McCullough's Masters of Rome series covering the late republican period through the civil wars, Sulla's dictatorship, the triumvirate, and finally Julius Caesar's rise and fall.

I also adore Jane Austen, Persuasion and Emma being my favorites.

[+ purplekow]

My favorite novel is Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov. Jane Austen is my favorite novelist. (Much of the time, Dostoevsky was in need of a good editor.) Somehow I don't think I'll find a lot of people here who share those preferences.

 

That's fine. Plenty of my Twitter friends are Austen fans. I can get my share of Austen discussion there (and have).

 

Movie and TV adaptations can do things books can't and sometimes bring in people who wouldn't or don't have time to read the books -- watching a TV version of David Copperfield is what got me to read the book after fizzling out on reading Oliver Twist because there were too many unfamiliar words -- but books also have advantages movies and TV don't. I usually wind up preferring the books. Occasionally I like both equally.

I am also a fan of The Brothers Karamazov. Jane Austen leaves me cold. Speaking of cold, I very much enjoyed Call of the Wild as a teen and have read it several times since.

[+ poolboy48220]

I'm a mostly science fiction type. I'm currently on the third Game of Thrones book. I loved "Devil in the White City", but found Larson's next book about the US Ambassador to Germany prior to WWII kind of boring. Fascinating events but that ambassador had SO little participation in any of them.

 

I'm in a couple of book clubs, one a group of friends that seems to have died a slow death (although we still get together regularly, the book aspect has dwindled). Our city's library has a book club that meets at a local bar to discuss the book and that's always fun, we're discussing "Watchmen" in a few weeks. My first pick for the other book club was "The Dark Knight Returns", and a few members said they came away from that with a new respect for the graphic novel medium.

 

Some biographies have been very good reads. Dorothy Parker's biography was a favorite, I'm still trying to finish Ellman's Oscar Wilde biography after many, many years. I bring it every year camping, but never manage to finish it.

 

I'm totally with Kurtis about wanting more time, especially now that I have a dog to take care of - lots of down time is just playing with her, rather than reading. I used to bring a book to the bar Friday afternoons after work & read over several beers, or read over dinner at a restaurant, but I'm much more of a homebody now. If I can tire the puppy out we'll crash on the couch and I can get some reading time in. :-)

[AdamSmith]

Right now rereading David McCullough's 1776, gripping on-the-ground account of the travails of Washington and his army across the vexing uncertain first year of the war. Also rereading Stanislaw Lem's Imaginary Magnitude, chiefly the novella GOLEM XIV about a sentient supercomputer created by the U.S. military for war gaming but which refuses such pointless activity, instead delivering a series of lectures on the nature of evolution, intelligence, Homo sapiens, and the ascending tree of constructed intelligences. For a taste, see here -- some zealot scanned the whole thing into GitHub: https://github.com/ilonajulczuk/laughing-archer/blob/master/library/Science Fiction/Imaginary magnitude-Stanislaw Lem.txt

 

On the next-to-reread pile, Middlemarch and Absalom, Absalom! On the ambition pile, Remembrance of Things Past, finally to read all the way through instead of just bits and snatches. Still dipping into at random, Thayer's Life of Beethoven that I noted here before: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/43591

[+ WilliamM]

My favorite novel is Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov. Jane Austen is my favorite novelist. (Much of the time, Dostoevsky was in need of a good editor.) Somehow I don't think I'll find a lot of people here who share those preferences.

 

My favorite book is Thomas Mann's "The Magic Mountain" and Austen's and Dostoevsky's books as well.

 

I read "The Brothers Karamazov" again in 2009.

 

Mann is somewhat out of fashion now, but at one time there were university courses devoted just to Kafka and Mann. I am sure students read the books, attended all the classes and were still confused about the two authors. I would be in that group as well.

 

Just my view, but a discussion group here would have to concentrate on books that everyone would read and not think about as a duty.

[Rudynate]

This is a great thread. I used to read voraciously, but now have difficulty maintaining my interest in a book long enough to finish it. The last fiction I read was "Snow" by Orhan Pamuk. I got bogged down in it about two thirds of the way through, and left it laying for months, then finally finished it. That says more about my reading habits than it does about whether or not it was a good book.

[Rudynate]

My favorite book is Thomas Mann's "The Magic Mountain" and Austen's and Dostoevsky's books as well.

 

 

I loved "The Magic Mountain." I think I even read it twice.

[+ purplekow]

I am also a fan of The Brothers Karamazov. Jane Austen leaves me cold.

Right now rereading David McCullough's 1776, gripping on-the-ground account of the travails of Washington and his army across the vexing uncertain first year of the war. Also rereading Stanislaw Lem's Imaginary Magnitude, chiefly the novella GOLEM XIV about a sentient supercomputer created by the U.S. military for war gaming but which refuses such pointless activity, instead delivering a series of lectures on the nature of evolution, intelligence, Homo sapiens, and the ascending tree of constructed intelligences. For a taste, see here -- some zealot scanned the whole thing into GitHub: https://github.com/ilonajulczuk/laughing-archer/blob/master/library/Science Fiction/Imaginary magnitude-Stanislaw Lem.txt

 

On the next-to-reread pile, Middlemarch and Absalom, Absalom! On the ambition pile, Remembrance of Things Past, finally to read all the way through instead of just bits and snatches. Still dipping into at random, Thayer's Life of Beethoven that I noted here before: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/43591

It took me about 5 attempts to read David McCullough's John Adams. I had it on my bedside table for about 2 years but once I was into it deep enough, I did find the story gripping though not McCullough's writing style.